2. Season chicken with salt and pepper to taste. In a large oven proof skillet heat the oil over medium-high heat. Add chicken. Turn once or twice while cooking, until brown on both sides. Transfer to a plate.

4. Stir the saffron into the vegetables. Add the rice and stir to coat them all. Stir in the broth and the oregano and bring to simmer. Return chicken to the skillet.

5. Cover pan and transfer to the oven. Bake 45 min.

6. Uncover and stir in tomatoes and their juices. Cover and bake another 15 min.

Verdict: I feel like I should have liked the recipe more than I did. I love chicken. I love rice. I love tomatoes. All together, I should have loved this dish, but I felt like it was missing something. It took me awhile thinking it over, but I came to the conclusion that I would have liked it to have either cheese, for a gooey texture, or a sauce.

I found this recipe on another food blog, though I adapted it a little. The original recipe had some chocolate melted on top with sprinkles of salt. We just made the cookie itself without any of extra topping stuff.

1 cup butter

3/4 cup sugar

1 cup brown sugar

2 eggs

1 1/2 tablespoon vanilla

1/4 cup caramel sauce

3 3/4 cups flour

1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt (didn’t use because we use salted butter)

1 12 ounce bag of chocolate chips

1. Preheat oven to 350F.

2. In a large bowl, beat together butter, sugar and brown sugar. Beat in eggs, vanilla and caramel sauce.

225g green beans, trimmed and blanched (we didn’t use, because I do not like beans)

1 cup croutons

1/3 cup virgin olive oil and balsamic vinegar dressing

1. First off, because my mom does not like raw onion, we brown the onion in a skillet.

2. I admit, our salad did not look as neat as the one on Kraft’s website, as we put everything together in one bowl and just tossed it together with the dressing.

Verdict: I liked but didn’t love this salad. The lettuce, bacon and croutons are all pretty standard salad ingredients. So the eggs were pretty much what made this recipe unique. While it added an interesting texture and taste to it, I really wasn’t won over to the idea of hard-boiled eggs in a salad.

1. Cook spaghetti as directed on the package. Reserve 1/2 cup of the cooking liquid. Drain pasta and return to cooking pot.

2. While pasta is cooking, heat olive oil in a skillet over medium heat. (Previously we were supposed to use the food processor to chop the bread into smaller pieces, but we went for more of a crouton size than a pea-size.) Fry bread and garlic for 4 min. Add capers (if using), parsley to taste (for us this is none) and lemon juice.

3. Stir into the pasta the bread mixture as well as the reserved cooking liquid. (We were supposed to sprinkle with Parmesan cheese but we just mixed it in as well.)

Verdict: I liked this, but not to the extent that I would make it again. All of the flavours worked really well, though sometimes we got a piece of bread that was too garlicy and another that was too lemony. As well, as a personal preference, I like my pasta dishes to have more of a sauce and the cooking liquid here that got mixed in and basically helped coat the pasta in the cheese and the garlic, really didn’t qualify as a sauce.

1 cup cooked rice (we used 2 cups because of the amount of liquid in the tomatoes)

1/2 cup frozen peas, thawed (I actually don’t know why it would make a difference between frozen, canned or fresh)

1 teaspoon hot sauce (we didn’t use, because we are not really a fan of anything hot or spicy. That probably means the dish really isn’t Spanish, though)

1/2 cup parsley (we didn’t use because we don’t really like parsley)

1. Heat oil in a deep skillet over medium-high heat. Add chicken, onion, garlic, salt and pepper. Cook, stirring often, until chicken is cooked. Add tomatoes and the juices and bring to a boil.

2. Stir in rice and cover. Reduce heat to low. Cook 25 min or until rice is tender. Stir in peas and co0k 1 to 2 min, until peas are hot.

3. (If using, right before serving, stir in hot sauce and parsley).

Verdict: I really liked this recipe. Chicken and rice is a classic combination and I like finding new ways to make the two together. Even without the hot sauce, I really enjoyed the tomato flavour of the dish.

5. Let cool about 1 hour. (The topping is pecans dipped in melted chocolate on top of whipped cream, but we had run out of pecans so we just topped pieces with whipped cream).

Verdict: Pecans are not my favourite. My sister doesn’t like them at all. But pecan pie is one of my mom’s favourites, so we made it this week for mother’s day. She loved the pie, more than the last one we made, though she wished there hadn’t been any chocolate chips in it.